Food for 7 billion

An international team of scientists has unveiled a plan that they say would double food production by 2050 while reducing the global environmental impact of agriculture.

Reporting in the journal Nature, scientists from the U.S., Canada, Sweden, and Germany said that the only way the world community could sustainably feed the estimated 9 billion to 10 billion people expected on the planet later this century would be by taking the five following steps:

halt expansion of farmland into tropical forests and wild lands; more efficiently use large swaths of underutilized farmland in Africa, Latin America, and Eastern Europe, boosting current food production by nearly 60 percent;

make more efficient use of water, fertilizers, and chemicals, which are currently overutilized in some areas and underutilized in others;

shift diets, especially in the developed world, from excessive meat consumption;

and reduce the amount of food that is discarded, spoiled, or eaten by pests, which currently amounts to about a third of the food supply.

The University of Minnesota’s Institute on the Environment which came out with the study has summarised it well as the world prepares to welcme its 7 billionth homo sapien. Increasingly, sustainability will become more than a fancy word used at all forums. It will mean the only way we can carry the race forward. Optimisation of resources and minimisation of waste will play a big role.